Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1887-11-18
CONCORD AND D1sCoRD,

Dr. Ialmage breaches at the BROOKLYN
Tabernacle.
The Whole Universe Was Once II Complete
Cadencc-Discortl Brought About by Sin
The Human Intellect Out of Tunc-How
To Restore Harmony.
BROOKLYN, Nov. G.-The main feature
IN the music of the Brooklyn tabernacle is
the congregational singing. To-day, after
the opening song, in which all the thou
sands heartily participated, Prof. Browne
gave on the organ Scherzo, opus Gil. by
Mendelssohn. The Rev. L. De Witt 'i'al
mage, ID. d., expounded chapter in the
first book of Samuel, where Saul, pos
sessed OF an evil spirit, threw a javelin at
Davld, who was playing on the harp be-
fore HIM, thus showing that the evil
spirit does not like sacred music. The
subject of the sermon was "Concord and
Dlscord," and the text was from Job
xXxviii, 6, Z: "Who laid the corner stone
thereof; whom the morning stars sang to-
gether?" DR.. Talmage said
We have all seen the ceremony at the
iaylns of the corner stone of church,
asylum, o. Masonic temple. Into the hol-
low OF the stone were placed scrolls of
history and important documents to be
suggestive if one or two hundred years
after the building should be destroyed by
hre or torn down. We remember the
silver troHel or iron hammer that smote
the square piece of granite into sanctity.
We remember some venerable man who
presided. welding the trowel or hammer.
We remsmber also the music as the choir
stood on the scattered stones and timber
Of the building about to be constructed.
The leaves OF the notebooks fiuttered in
the wind and We're turned over with great
rustling, and we remember how the bass,
baritone, tenor, contralto, and soprano
voices commingled. They had for many
days been rehearsing the special program,
that it might be worthy Of the corner stone
laying.
In my text the poet of Uz calls us to a
grander ceremony-the laying of the
foundation of this great temple of a world.
The corner stone was block of light, and
the trowel was of celestial crystal. All
about and on the embankments of cloud
stood the angelic choristers, unrolling their
hbrattos of overture, and other worlds
slapped shining cymbals while the cere-
mony went on, and God, the architect, by
stroke of light after stroke of light, dedi-
Gated this great cathedral of world, with
mountains for pillars, and sky for frescoed
ceiling, and. Towering fields for floor, and
sunrise and midnight aurora for up.
holstery. "Who laid the corner stone
thereof, when. the morning stars sang to-
gether?"
The fact is that the whole universe was Il
complete cadence, an unbroken dithyramb,
a musical portfolio. The great sheet of
immensely has been spread out, and writ
ten on it We're the stars, the smaller of
them minims, the larger of them sustained
notes. The meteors marked the staccato
passage, the whole heavens q gamut, with
all sounds, intonations and medulations,
the space between the worlds 1ausical in :
terval, trembling of stellar light d quaver,
the thunder base clef, the wind among
trees treble clef. That is the way God
made all things, perfect harmony.
But one day harp string snapped in
the great orchestra. One day voice
sounded out of tune. One day discord,
harsh and terrific, grated upon the glorious
antiphone. 1t was sin that made the dis
sonance, and that harsh discord has been
sounded through the centuries. All the
work of Christians, and philanthropists, and
reformers of all ages, is to stop that dis
cord and get all thing backs into the perfect
harmony which was heard at the laying OF
the corner stone when the morning stars
sang together. Before get through, if am
divinely helped, will make it plain that
sin is discord and righteousness is har-
mony.
That things in general are out Of tune is
as plain as to IL musicians ear is the un-
happy clash of clarionet and bassoon in an
orchestral rendering.
The worlds health out of tune: Weak
lung and the atmosphere in collision, dis
ordered eye and MONDAY light in quarrel,
rheumatic limb and damp weather in
struggle, neuralgies, and pneumonias, and
consumptions, and epilepsies in focks
swoop upon neighborhood and cities.
Where you find one person with sound
throat, and keen eyesight, and alert ear,
and easy respiration, aud regular pulsa-
ton, and supple limb, and prime digestion,
and steady nerves, you find hundred who
have to be very careful because this, or that,
or the other physical function is disor-
dered.
The human intellect out of tune: The
Judgment wrongly swerved, or the memory
leakv, or the will weak. or the temper in
ceptional. Domestic life out of tune:
Only here and there coniugal outbreak
of incompatibility of temper through the
divorce courts, or a hlial outbreak about a
fathers will through the surrogates court,
or a case of wife beating or husband poi
soning through the criminal courts, but
thousands of families with June outside
and January within.
Society out of tune: Labor and capital;
their hands on each others throat. Spirit
of caste keeping those down in the social
scale in struggle to get up, and putting
those who are up in anxiety less they have
to come down. No wonder the old piano.
forte of society is all out of tune, when
hypocrisy, and lying, and subterfuge, and
double dealing, and sycophancy, and char
latanism, and revenge have for 5000 years
been banging away at the keys and stamp
ing the pedals.
On all sides there is perpetual ship
wrech of harmonies. Nations in discord.
Without realizing it, so wrong is the feel
in of nation that the symbols chosen are
fierce and destructive. In this country.
where our skies are full of robins and
doves and morning larks, we have for na-
tional symbol the fierce and filthy eagle, as
immoral bird as can be found in all the
pathological catalogues. In Great Brit
ian, where they have lambs and fallow
deer, their symbol is the merciless lion.
In Russia, where from between her frozen
north and blooming south oil kindly beasts
dwell, they choose the growing bear; and
in the worlds herallry favorlte figure is
&Ia n which,, ic wiOfyn1 enrnaOt fa.